Wednesday, May 6, 2015

You all know that my blog is about my everyday cooking. And our daily cooking has so much of vegetables in it. So, bringing in variety to the taste plays an important part in breaking the monotony. Adding Dal or lentil to a dry vegetable has been in our tradition for ages. The Beans Paruppussli Is legentary

For vegetarians the main source of proteins is the wholegrains and the lentils.

The Paruppussli has been my favourite since childhood !!

Vegetables blended with the Dal and the spices....and that extra dash of Oil...Oh! just too delicious!

As I have mentioned,this dish is a kind of legendary and every family has it's own method of cooking the Paruppu usili.

I am sharing the way I make it .

Recipe Courtesy: Mrs.Prema Pattabiraman

INGREDIENTS

1. Beans- 1/2 kg - chopped

2.Pigeon peas dal / toor dal - 1/ 4 cup( you can add more if you like more dal in your vegetable)

3. Dry Red chillies-3 to 4 ( depends on the variety of chilli that you use)

4. Salt to taste

5. Sesame oil or any other oil.

6.curry leaves

7. Mustard seeds, husked black gram,asafoetida for tempering.

8. Turmeric powder- a pinch

METHOD

1.Steam cook the beans. They have to be cooked 'Al Dente'. The crunchiness of beans adds to the taste of paruppussli. If you are using a pressure cooker, then after two whistles, show the cooker directly under tap water. This helps release steam and the beans is not overdone. But I would suggest you to use a steamer for boiling.

2. Soak the Tool dal in a cup of water along with the red chillies for one hour. Drain the water completely. Add salt,asafoedita ( a pinch).Then grind it coarsely. You can add 2 tsps of water if it is difficult to grind.

3. Important step: Add 2 tsp of sesame oil to the ground mixture and mix well with a spoon.

4. Transfer this to a bowl and pressure cook it for 3 whistles. Let it cool completely.

5. You can powder this using a mixer or loosen it up using your hands. Unless I am making a huge batch, I use my hand as it just crumbles beautifully. Few lumps here and there is absolutely fine as it only adds to the taste. But if you are a perfectionist, then just go ahead and grind.

6. In a wok or pan, add a tsp of oil ,mustard and husked black gram. When they crackle, add the beans . Add turmeric powder,curryleaves.

7. add the prepared toor dal mixture and saute' it for 5 minutes.

8. Then add the beans. Add salt ( as the beans has no salt). Let it ccok for 5 to 10 minutes.

The traditional Beans Paruppussli is ready!!! This recipe is passed down through generations.

Shall soon share different versions of this recipe.

If you have'nt yet tried this recipe for the fear of failure, do give it a try! It is not that difficult!

Just 2 important points to remember:

1. When you add the beans to the paruppussli, it has to be completely dry. If there is water content ,it is a good idea to saute' it seperately before you add it to the Paruppussli.

2. Add sesame oil to the ground batter before you pressure cook them. This helps in avoiding the batter sticking to the vessel.